In 2016, I began a PhD in Evolution and Behaviour in the Barrett-Henzi lab at the University of Lethbridge. Knowing about my fascination with nature in general, and coyotes specifically, one of my supervisors suggested I consider working on urban wildlife. I leapt at the opportunity to delve into my interest in this subject and to develop not only my theoretical understanding, but also my art practice in response. I am fortunate enough to have a committee that supports my art being a large part of my studies. This results in the body of work titled Backyard Wilderness. Thus far this work includes exhibitions, billboards, vinyl wraps of utility boxes, and a comic book presentation of the data collected for my dissertation.
My concerns now are less about how “real” nature is and more about the realities of increasing urbanization, the resulting novel ecosystems that result, as well as other pertinent issues such as habitat fragmentation, synanthropes, the extinction of experience, personal ecology, roadkill, and invasive species.
The work presented here all has the goal of promoting coexistence with urban wildlife. The problem for coexistence is that humans still want to dominate within the urban context. Urban wildlife cause damage to conventional living spaces and structures. Skunks spray dogs and deer eat lovingly tended gardens. Sometimes these situations can get a little uncomfortable. Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing writes, “In this time of diminished expectations, I look for disturbance-based ecologies in which many species sometimes live together without either harmony or conquest.”1 And I think that is an appropriate goal. Maybe we can’t achieve harmony but perhaps we can avoid conquest. Coexistence doesn’t have to be utopian. It can be reimagining our yards and gardens as more than self-contained units. Maybe it’s more about collaborating with other species rather than dominating (or exterminating) them.
Tsing asks, what if the very things we think of as trivial are at the centre of the systematicity we seek? I champion Tsing’s concepts and further ask, what if urban wildlife is more than trivial? What if it is a key? A relationship with urban wildlife could provide us with a gateway to understanding our own precarious situation and a means for moving forward in uncertain times.
1 Tsing, A. L. (2015). The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins. Princeton University Press, Princeton.